TX AG Booked and Fingerprinted: 11 Things You Need to Know

Following the booking and fingerprinting of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, here are 11 things you need to know:

1). Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton was booked, photographed, and charged with felony securities fraud at 10:45 a.m. Monday morning. He was booked in the Collin County jail but could have been processed in any one of the 254 counties in Texas.

2). Paxton has been charged with two counts of securities fraud which are first degree felonies, and a third degree felony for failing to register with the Texas State Securities Board.

3). WFAA-ABC in Dallas first reported on Sunday that a grand jury indicted Paxton last Tuesday and that charges would be unsealed in McKinney at about noon on Monday. The media outlet said it had “several sources” for this information.

4). A source told Breitbart Texas that Paxton is the one who leaked the fact that he had been indicted to the Dallas press. Paxton is from McKinney, Texas, in Collin County, near Dallas, Texas.

5). It is also possible that information about the investigation of the Texas attorney general was leaked by Texas State Representative Bryon Cook or one of his colleagues. One of the counts Paxton is charged with involves investors who were friends of Paxton and Rep. Cook.

6). Cook is a chief lieutenant for Texas House Speaker Joe Straus. Paxton ran against Straus for speaker in 2011.

7). Speaker Straus, Rep. Cook, and former Texas State Representative Dan Branch are from the “establishment” wing of the Republican party. Paxton is from the “anti-establishment” and Tea Party wing.

8). Paxton and Branch were both candidates in the primary runoff for Attorney General in 2014 and it is Dan Branch that first brought up the issue of a state securities law violation by Paxton. He did so during the primary race.

9). In May of 2014, the Texas State Securities Board fined then-Texas State Senator Paxton $1,000. The order issued from the Texas State Securities Board “reprimanded” Paxton for acting as an investment adviser representative for one company (Mowery Capital Management, LLC, MCM) when that company was registered as an adviser with the state securities board. The board closed the matter without referring it to the Texas Attorney General’s Office for criminal prosecution, something within the power of the Board to do.

10). Later, a left-of-center “watchdog” group associated with requests for investigations and indictments against then-Governor Rick Perry, and former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom Delay, asked the Travis County district attorney’s office to investigate then-Republican Party AG nominee Paxton. The executive director of Texans for Public Justice sent a letter to the Travis County DA asking for an investigation three months before the November 2014 elections. The Austin-based nonprofit is funded by the Rockefeller Family Fund and a foundation whose top political recipient was reported to be the Ready for Hillary PAC.

11). The two special prosecutors in the case are well-respected criminal defense lawyers out of Houston, Texas. One of them, Brian Wice, successfully defended former House Majority Leader Tom Delay on appeal. The other special prosecutor, Kent Schaffer has over 30 years of criminal law experience. Schaffer has represented noted, political, business, and entertainment figures in criminal and civil matters.

Lana Shadwick is a contributing writer and legal analyst for Breitbart Texas. She has served in Texas as a prosecutor and associate judge. Follow her on Twitter @LanaShadwick2